


You just try your best not to get hurt (The older I get)

by vexxedBereavement



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: 5+1 Things, Andrew Minyard Loves Neil Josten, Angst, Canonical Child Abuse, Drabble, Fluff, M/M, Mary Hatford is a Bad Mom, Not Beta Read, One Shot, POV Neil Josten, Probably bad, Soft Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard, Torture, fuck you nora they love each other, hope you like it, i love neil and s does andrew, i wrote it prety quickly, just grammerly and my dumbass, k bye, my boys heal okay, thats why I wrote this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:21:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25379092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vexxedBereavement/pseuds/vexxedBereavement
Summary: I used to close my eyes and pray for a whole 'nother familyWhere everything was fine, one that felt like mineI swore I'd never be like themBut I was just a kid back then5 times Neil was told he looked like his father and 1 time it didn't matter (because he was beautiful anyway).
Relationships: Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Comments: 2
Kudos: 132





	You just try your best not to get hurt (The older I get)

**Author's Note:**

> CONTENT WARNING:Child Abuse, Vague Torture
> 
> title and summary quote is from 'Older' by Sasha Slone 
> 
> yo guys. still working on that college au 5+1 its just taking longer than expected. i wrote this real quick like so its probably not super good but I think its fun. also listen to heather by Conan gray. that has nothing to do w/ this fic its just good music.

He had always been called his father's son, since the day he was born. Which isn’t surprising. Early on, it was just because that was how he had been raised. He was supposed to be his fathers next in line, the next butcher. He was named after the man for a reason after all.

Lola would grab at his arms when he was younger, pulling him up and into her lap. (Causing scratch marks that would sometimes last for days, forcing him to wear long sleeves even in the summer heat.) She would tug at his hair with a scuffed up brush, styling it in the roughest way possible. Then she would stroke his cheek and whisper about how ‘handsome’ he was. ‘You look just like your daddy’ she’d say with a wicked grin. ‘So handsome Junior, so pretty.’ Her words made him sick to his stomach.

His mother would keep him away when she could, which wasn’t much. At night she would rake her hands through his hair, her fingernails digging into his scalp, mussing up his previously styled locks and muttering about ‘that bitch’ and ‘if she fucking put her hands on you one more time’. Then she would smile at him, though it looked forced, and he could tell from the look in her eyes that she was thinking what Lola was saying. 

He smiled back anyway, though even then he took note of the scratch marks on her face, similar to those on his arms.

There was an old chef that his father had hired to cook meals for everyone that worked at the Wesninski household. He had a kind smile and dark hair that matched his playful brown eyes. Nathaniel would visit him in the kitchen from time to time, always with his hood pulled up and his hair in his eyes. The chef would always ask who he was, and Nathaniel would always stay quiet. The chef would then tell him stories of his hometown and his old lovers and tales his grandmother had told him when he was just a boy. Nathaniel always made an effort to think of stories he could tell the man, even if he never spoke in his presence. 

One day, while Nathaniel was nodding along to the cadence of the chef's soft and deep voice, his hood fell off. The chef looked at him and smiled. 

‘You must be Mr.Wesninski’s son.’ He said, swiping Nathaniel’s bangs out of his eyes, which made the boy recoil. ‘You look just like him.’ 

Nathaniel stopped visiting the kitchen after that. It had little to do with the fact that his father beat him black and blue after finding out about his shenanigans and more with the vicious recognition in the chef’s eyes. That was the day Nathaniel realized that just because someone was nice, didn’t mean they could be trusted. Just because the chef told silly fables of talking animals didn’t mean he was clueless to the darker things that happened in the Wesninski home. Didn’t mean he was innocent.

He did not realize how much this lesson would be emphasized later in his life.

Early on, when they had just started running, Abram had lost his contacts. His mother was furious with him, and freaking out over what they were supposed to do. Abram suggested that he just go without the contacts until they could get more. The look in his mother’s eyes after the words slipped from his mouth was terrifying. It reminded him of his father too much.

That was the first time she hit him. 

Her hand burned like fire as it hit his cheek, creating a deafening smack. Her words stung even more. ‘Don’t be fucking stupid Abram. Your eyes look just like his. You look just like him.”

Abram didn’t say anything about the fact that her eyes looked more like his fathers in that moment.

Abram ended up faking blindness after his mother found a scuffed up cane in the garbage. She bought a cheap pair of sunglasses to go with it and no one questioned him about it. He did get some odd looks for the remnants of a slap mark on his face. That didn’t stop his mother from giving him another for ‘drawing to much attention’.

There was a girl in Abram’s class with clunky glasses and freckles all over her face. She wore sweaters every single day, even when it wasn’t cold and she had to roll up her sleeves. The girl’s name started with ‘E’, but he can’t remember what it was. She sat next to him in math class and never tried to cheat off of him like the other kids. One day she turned to him and started to talk. He didn’t say anything back to her but he also didn’t tell her to stop talking so maybe she took that as encouragement because she continued to talk his ear off every class.

Abram wouldn’t say they were friends, because then his mother would beat him, but they kind of were.

‘Y’know I don’t look like my dad all that much. Take after my mom.” the girl said, her accent lilting as she spat the words quickly. Abram nodded. ‘What about you, Max? Y’don’t look much like yer mom.” Max, the name he was going by currently. Mary would pick him up from school every day as she didn’t trust him to walk ‘home’ safely, causing his classmates to be familiar with the way her current identity looked. Abram nodded again. “Y’look like yer dad?” she asked, pushing her glasses up her nose. “Must. Betcha look just like ‘em.” 

Abram just stared so she moved on to another topic. 

He wishes he remembered her name. 

Riko taunted him while he tortured. Which wasn’t new, almost everyone did. 

That didn’t make the taunts any less painful.

Neil (was he Neil right now? Or was he just Four?) was cuffed to Riko’s bed, his legs restricted and aching from Exy practice. The knife digging into his skin was blunt, which just made the experience even more excruciating. The blade was a stark contrast from the soft mattress he was laying on and it caused him to jerk against his restraints, which did nothing to help his current situation. 

‘Would you like to know something Four?” he whispered in Japanese, something Neil was forced to learn in the Nest along with how to play Exy while being covered in bruises and cuts, leaning down towards him. 

‘You look just like your Father. Same hair, same eyes.” he digs the knife in deeper. 

Neil screams. 

‘But your Father, he’s smart. He wouldn’t sell himself just to save some psycho he barely knows.’ 

Neil tries not to remember anything more. 

Andrew stares at him. Though he chastizes Neil for staring, he himself does it just as much. 

They’re sitting on the roof like they always are, cigarettes in hand. It’s Andrew’s last year at Palmetto, and graduation is only a few weeks away. The sun is setting and it gives everything a somber feeling. The hard metal of the roof digs into his ass, but Neil could care less when Andrew is this close and looking directly at him. 

‘Why?’ Neil asks out of the blue, breaking the silence. 

‘What?’ Andrew bites out in response, clearly annoyed at the loss of quiet. 

‘Why do you tell me not to stare, when you stare just as much?’ 

Andrew gives him an unimpressed glance. And because they’re allowed to be soft, and are allowed to be sentimental Andrew says:

“You’re worth looking at.” 

“Andrew.” 

“Neil” 

He takes a deep breath.

“You know I care about you right?” 

Andrew just nods, and the silence is back. 

Neil doesn’t think about his father at that moment because his father has nothing to do with this. This is all Andrew and Neil. All their insecurities and vulnerabilities blended into pure beauty. 

This is everything. 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! leave a comment and kudos if you enjoyed for I am a gremlin that feeds of validation. 
> 
> hit me up 
> 
> Email  
> aestheticallypleasingramen@gmail.com
> 
> Instagram   
> soup_nd_crackwrs


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